Everybody On Broadway Wants A Piece Of The Producers

May 8, 2000|The New York Times

Who is going to produce The Producers?

That has been a hot question along Broadway as word spread that David Geffen, the Hollywood and music mogul, had opted out of producing the show and that several other major players were vying for the spot.

The Producers, the brainchild of comedian Mel Brooks, is the musical adaptation of his 1968 film satire about a pair of scheming moneymen who produce a surefire flop, "Springtime for Hitler," in hopes of bilking theatrical investors. Instead, the show becomes a runaway hit and comedy ensues.

The musical, with a score by Brooks, had a reading on April 9 at the Nola Studios in Manhattan. It starred Nathan Lane as the lecherous Max Bialystock and Evan Pappas as Leo Bloom, a nebbish accountant-turned- producer. (The two were played by Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder in the film.)

While most who saw the reading said that the piece still needed work, the show generated strong buzz inside the very realm it skewers.

"Everybody jumped up at the end and said, `Me, me, me,'" said one producer who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of spoiling his chances of joining the project. "They smell a hit."

Brooks has written about a dozen songs in addition to the two howlingly funny tunes from the film: Springtime for Hitler and Love Power. The book is by Brooks and Tom Meehan.

Perhaps the strongest suit is the show's potential director, Susan Stroman, who has already scored this season with Contact and whose coming revival of The Music Man has been generating a buzz of its own.

Stroman directed the reading of The Producers and is thought to have an emotional connection to the piece: Her husband, the director Mike Ockrent, was closely involved in its creative genesis before he died of leukemia in December.

Geffen had been instrumental in persuading Brooks to press ahead with the project, said Alan U. Schwartz, Brooks' lawyer. But in March, Geffen and Brooks agreed (amicably, Schwartz said) that Geffen would not be the show's producer. A call to Geffen's office in Los Angeles was not returned.

"David has been very helpful in getting Mel to sit down and do this," Schwartz said. "But David has his other world."

Since then, several Broadway producing organizations have proposed taking over the project, including the Dodger Theatricals, Jujamcyn, the Nederlanders, SFX Entertainment, Richard Frankel Productions and Barry and Fran Weissler.